Friday, 4 May 2007

All of the worlds problems, all of its failings and flaws, can be summed up in one single issue. My bugbear. The "full" packet of Doritos.

I can't figure out whether when I was young, it was just that my hands were smaller, or the packets were smaller, or there was just more crisps in the packet, but I remember the crisps used to touch the top of the packet when you opened it. You used to be able to buy a packet of crisps and receive for your 2 and thrupenny-half tuppence a bag of crisps.

I think a better name these days is "a bag with crisps". Try it the next time you are in a bar. "I'll have a bag with crisps please". Obviously name which type of crisps you want as part of that statement. I have left my quote unspecific because with all of the many thousands of you that read this page, I might somehow tip the crisp market as a result of all you guys going, "Hey yeah, I haven't had XXXX in ages. Mmmmmm......XXXX". Now as a result of that particular statement, no doubt some of you are now hankering for a pint of 4 X. And there maybe a few of you now thinking about porn (a statistically reliable statement at the best of times).

So you get your bag of crisps and open it. This is where the marketing companies just stop caring. You have parted with you hard earned shillings and now they couldn't care less what you thought of them. Perhaps we should have all crisp packets made out of transparent plastic, and hung up on a crisp appreciation board to allow for comparison. In this situation you might realise. "Hey! There's sod all crisps in that!" But we don't. We look at the gargantuan bags with bright colours and made up flavours ("Tangy cheese"? I always know Doritos by "Orange" and "Blue" flavour), and select them based on how we remember one crisp tasting.

I think that the main reason behind the oversizing of bags, apart from to make them look like they could satisfy us more (which they never, ever do), is to protect the crisps. Yeah right. There is no way of protecting crisps, short of making the packets rigid, or making the crisps out of polystyrene (ie Monster Munch). There is always the crisp post-apocalypse at the bottom of every packet. A wasteland where the remaining, crippled crisp-ettes shelter in the corners.

So we come to my new invention. Its the reinforced crisp packet. I take my inspiration from staring up at a training hall recently. Its roof structure was a lattice of struts. Now I didn't immediately think, "Hey what a great storage area for crisps", but instead I saw the crisps this morning and think "That needs some roofing struts".

Imagine it. Bags of crisps, full, to the brim, with every one of them perfect. It may cost a little more per bag, but who wouldn't want to part with an extra Half crown hapen-shilling for this satisfaction?